In The Mood For Celebration

United State Of Electronica “La Discoteca” – By combining the focused intensity of Andrew WK, the French disco moves of Daft Punk, the silliness of the B-52s, the camp of the Scissor Sisters, the smiling punk of early Bis, the sugary hooks of The New Pornographers, and the up-with-people lovey dovey vibe of a dozen Polyphonic Sprees, The United State Of Electronica have made what could be the most joycore album of 2004. This is dance rock, but very far removed from the dour post-punk/funk fusions which have dominated indie for the past few years. Before hearing this record, I am not sure if the concept of blending twee indie with the style of Daft Punk and The Avalanches would have ever occurred to me, but now that I’ve heard this, I’m not sure how we all ever lived without it. (Click here to buy it from Sonic Boom Records.)

Lopazz “I Need Ya” – This is disco rock at its most woozy – a strangely languorous groove with keyboard parts which almost recall slowed-down car honks, and a vocalist who sounds like a very drunk man attempting to sing The Rapture’s “I Need Your Love.” (Click here to buy it directly from Output Recordings.)

Also: Thanks to my friend Deric Holloway, the beta version of Fluxblog’s new look has gone live today. We’re still in the process of tweaking the design, so there is a very good possibility that some of this will look all wrong in certain browsers. (I am using Mozilla, and I know that the borders on the links column isn’t right. If you notice other glitches, please let us know in the comments box.) Please bear with us – Deric is going to be working on this site for a while to come, and eventually everything will be just right. As it is right now, I’m very happy with the new color scheme and the logo.

Elsewhere: Be sure to check out the latest sound collage in the Weeping Mule series over on the Phonequail site. This new one is my favorite to date, and includes some incredible found audio from conference calls.

And: “In fact, in all honesty, I WANT TO SHAVE OFF ALAN MOORE’S BEARD AND BURN IT IN SOME KIND OF RITUAL THAT KILLS COMICS SO THEY CAN BE REBUILT FOR THE GREATER GOOD.” – John Cei Douglas, after attending this past weekend’s Bristol Comics Festival. I can get behind that sentiment!